Stay on target

After last night, there’s only one episode left of Once Upon a Time. The show is starting to feel like it too. There’ll be much more of this next week, but last night’s episode featured a few characters whose only purpose was to remind us of past seasons. And that’s fine. When a show lasts seven years, it deserves a little nostalgia fest. The episode began with a younger Henry seeking adventure. Hi again, Jared Gilmore! He’s still looking for his own epic tale, which apparently means he wants some fairy tale strange. He rides into a cave, finds a sleeping princess and is about to kiss her when he’s interrupted by a dragon. And by the prince who’s actually supposed to kiss this particular Sleeping Beauty.

The prince defeats the dragon, kisses the princess, and the two walk off happily ever after. With the princess mentioning Henry’s the brother she never had. Ouch, kid. But it looks like Henry and the Wish Realm Dark One have some history. As Henry’s about to ride away from embarrassment, the Dark One approaches. He offers Henry a little help, which Henry refuses. The kid is finally smarter than that, everybody! It only took seven seasons. As Henry rides away, The Dark One swears he’ll prove Henry needs him to get a happy ending.

Robert Carlyle (Photo via ABC)

In modern day Seattle, the curse is broken, but not everything is perfect. Regina realizes she hasn’t heard from Facilier in a while. She investigates his apartment, and finds Rumplestiltskin. He breaks the news that Facilier’s dead, and his Wish Realm counterpart is causing trouble in town. How much trouble? Henry is happily spending time with his family in the corniest birthday celebration we’ve ever seen on this show. And that’s saying something. But just as he’s about to blow out the candles, Lucy and Cinderella disappear. Behind Henry, the Dark One reveals he’s sent them to the wish realm.

This is how he’s going to force Henry to make a deal for a happy ending. The Dark One tells Henry to get Rumplestiltskin’s Dark One Dagger. In exchange, he’ll get his family back. It appears that if Rumplestiltskin destroys his dagger, all versions of the Dark One will lose their power. So that’s what’s at stake for these final two episodes of Once Upon a Time. While I’m sure this was originally envisioned as a season-long arc, it is a fitting story to end this series on: The defeat of the Dark One in all realms.

Lana Parrilla (Photo: ABC/Jack Rowand)

Fortunately, Henry is still smart enough not to just do whatever the villain tells him to. He tells his family exactly what’s going on, and Regina reminds everyone that under no circumstances do they negotiate with villains. The Mills (and Swan, I guess) family “kicks ass and protects the ones [they] love.” That’s just a really good line. Fortunately, Hook has a plan. He’s from the Wish Realm, and thanks to Alice’s packrat mentalities, he may have a portal home. He produces a mirror, but there’s a crack in it. It still opens a portal, but the group is split up on the journey. Henry and Regina end up in the Dark One’s castle. There, they find Peter Pan! It looks like in this world, Rumplestiltskin captured his father and put him in stocks. It’s cool that the show is bringing back all these old plot points in these final two episodes. Even if they don’t have that much bearing on the plot, it’s a nice reminder of all the stories this show has told.

Meanwhile, Hook and our Rumple have ended up in the Wish Realm’s version of Rumple’s old home. The place he lived with Baelfire before he became the Dark One. The place he proved himself a coward by hobbling himself so he wouldn’t have to fight. Fortunately, he has Hook with him, who is much more familiar with the world of the Wish Realm. He takes Rumple to the Grotto where he nearly gave up on seeing Alice ever again. That is, until he found a friend. It’s Ariel! After some lightly humorous confusion as to why Hook is traveling with the Dark One (or someone who looks like him,) Ariel gives him some squid ink to aid in the fight. Like any good two-part finale, it’s playing all the hits.

Robert Carlyle (Photo: ABC/Jack Rowand)

That trend continues with Henry and Regina back at the castle. Finding an odd piece of meat meant for an animal, they run into Cruella DeVille! I have to hand it to this show. Even though it’s ending on this odd epilogue, these last few episodes are reminding me of everything I loved about Once Upon a Time over the years. Henry has a swordfight with Cruella, which doesn’t fit the character at all, but it looks cool enough. Once she’s defeated, Henry and Regina find Cinderella and Lucy. But The Dark One appears and puts them in a snow globe. And if Henry doesn’t comply with his demands in time, the snow will kill his family.

Hook and Rumple show up, and Henry starts acting like a big ol’ jerk. Hey, he’s gotten better, but he can still be that same dumb kid. Especially now that his family is in danger. He wants to give the Dark One the Dagger, even going as far as saying Rumplestiltskin doesn’t deserve his happy ending. Good thing he has Regina there to tell him what a complete ass he’s being. In a loving, motherly way, of course. Rumplestiltskin does have a plan, though. He runs off with the squid ink to carry it out, and Regina follows to make sure he’s on the up and up. Henry starts researching to figure out a way to save his family. He does find one and starts to run off. Hook offers to go with him, but Henry knocks him out. If Hook knew where he was going, he’d try to stop him. Damn it, Henry! I thought you grew out of this crap.

Victoria Smurfit (Photo via ABC)

Even worse though, Rumple’s plan to kill the Dark One doesn’t go as planned. He traps the Dark One in place with squid ink, and is about to stab him when Regina interrupts. That allows the Dark One to escape, but not before revealing his true plan. It all revolves around a prophesy that Henry will be the one to defeat the Dark One. He wants to make sure that doesn’t happen. So for the big Once Upon a Time finale, we’re cribbing from Harry Potter. Well, there are worse stories this show has ripped off in past seasons, I guess.

Meanwhile, Henry’s gone to get this realm’s version of the author’s pen. I wondered when that thing would show up again. The guardian of the pen looks into Henry’s heart and sees the whole story. He has some great lines about how the timelines alone make it an exceedingly complicated story. Now I just want a whole scene of him reviewing the entire story of this show. I wonder what he thought of that awful Frozen season. Or that worse Once Upon a Time in Wonderland spin-off. In any case, Henry gets the pen, but not for long. As soon as he sits down to write the story, the Dark One appears. The pen was what he was after all along. And he has an author to use it. It’s young Wish Realm Henry. So that’s who we saw at the beginning of the episode. This Henry’s life just kept on being sad. He never got any wishes. And he’s perfectly happy to write a happy ending for the Dark One if it means he gets one as well.

Andrew J. West, Jared Gilmore, Robert Carlyle (Photo via ABC)

And he does. At the Dark One’s suggestion, he takes away the power of the Guardian. With no restrictions on his power, he traps everyone but Regina in the snow globe. Why leave Regina? That’s what Wish Realm Henry gets out of this: Revenge for her killing his parents and grandparents. Yes, it’s not this Regina that did it, but that doesn’t matter to him. Bitter angry Henry is even dumber than the regular one. So the episode leaves us on a cliffhanger, but not without a moment of hope. Now, I probably would have preferred ending on the cliffhanger. It’s a nice tense moment to carry us through to the finale next week. And the scene that follows, with Alice and Robin finding a magic bean to go help, is too long. It’s long and flat and devoid of tension. At this point, we’re just waiting for the episode to end. And then…

They don’t go to the Wish Realm right away. Instead, they go get help. They use the portal to drive right into Storybrooke. They really are bringing everyone back for the series finale, and that’s a genuinely exciting place to leave us on. Again, they maybe didn’t want to cram all this plot into the final two episodes, but the show is doing the best with the hand it’s been dealt. With a return to Storybrooke, it looks like we’re in for a fantastic series finale.